Once, five blind men were sitting under a palm tree by the bank of a river. They sensed that someone or something had silently crept up and joined them.

“Who is there?”, asked the first blind man. There was no reply so he got to his feet and walked forward with his arms outstretched. After a few steps, his hand hit something flat, rough and solid in front of him. “It’s a wall!”, he cried triumphantly.

“Don’t be stupid.”, cried the second blind man standing up. “How can someone have built a wall right under your noses without us hearing?” The second blind man moved forward. He too felt about in front of him. “Aha!”, he said delightedly as he ran his hands down a hard stick-like thing. “It’s a spear.”

At that the third blind man got up to join them. “A wall and a spear!”, he sneered. “Obviously neither of you has any idea of what the thing is.” His fingers closed around something fatty and wiggly. “It’s nothing more than a piece of old rope.”, he laughed.

“How can you say that?”, argued the forth blind man, who had jumped up and joined in without anyone noticing. “I am standing here with my arms wrapped around something so big that my fingers are barely touching together. It’s a tree trunk.”

“I suppose I have to settle this.”, sniffed the fifth blind man as he rose. He stuck out his hand confidently and grabbed hold of something long and swaying. “Help!”, he shouted. “It’s a snake! It’s a snake!”

Suddenly, whoops of laughter filled the air and the blind men heard a little boy giggle. “You are all wrong. You are actually holding parts of an elephant and you all look really silly.”

At that, the first blind man stopped patting the elephant’s side. The second blind man stopped stroking the elephant’s tusk. The third blind man stopped holding the elephant’s tail. The fourth blind man stopped hugging the elephant’s leg and the fifth blind man let go off the elephant’s trunk.

From that day on, the five blind men never argued again.